(no subject)

[bandonbanshee.livejournal.com]

Um. Hello.

I sort of joined this community on a whim - but I do have another reason, I swear! I'm going to be spending a month in Moscow this summer, working in a hospital, so I figure that some familiarity with the language might help me - as things stand, I know nothing... Which is a little unfortunate, to say the least.

Anyhoo - hello to everyone. :)

Comments

[svetosila.livejournal.com]

I'm a native of Moscow, I live here and I know English, so feel free to ask me any relevant ^))) questions through comments in my LJ (which is in Russian). As for tips on quick learning, try at least to learn the Cyrillic alphabet, that'll come in handy.

[bandonbanshee.livejournal.com]

Thank you! :) Yes - we're slightly worried about street signs and placenames and the like, so the Cyrillic alphabet is definitely on our to-do list. (There are six of us going altogether)

[svetosila.livejournal.com]

As there are 6 of you, i would recommend, ideally, if you can afford the fees and find time, to hire a private tutor for the lot of you, preferably a native speaker of Russian who has experience of working with groups. There are good methods of intensive language teaching. The professor, sadly, is the key here - if he or she isn't a good professional, you won't learn anything. But with a good professor, miracles happen. If you work among Russians here, you'll soon pick up basic vocabulary. But you'd better learn some grammar and phonetics beforehand.

[bandonbanshee.livejournal.com]

We should be getting lessons organised for us but we're hoping to persuade the Central Languages Services in our own university to give us some lessons before we go...

[wolk-off.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Cyrillics are essential - some street signs in Moscow are dubbed in English, but this normally doesn't help too much since the dubbing, if it is available at all, comes in really small letters :) I have experienced a Moscow ride with the driver who was a South-African diplomat with no knowledge of Cyrillics - that was something very special, should I say! "This way or that way? What's the name of this street?.. oh boy, I'm lucky to have a native speaker with me... how you say that - Sheremetyevskaya? I'll be ******ed!" etc.

[welgar.livejournal.com]

Yeah, very few street signs are dubbed. And even these are still hard to understand for English-speakers since it's a Russian-Latin transliteration, not just plain English.
E.g., not many foreigners can tell how to pronounce "Ploschad' Revoljutsii" right. ;-)

BTW, some names and words are easy to understand if you know how they sound.

[bandonbanshee.livejournal.com]

Russian-Latin? I can only hope that one of my other languages will help me through!

Hmm, sound is another issue altogether! Gah! I have so much to learn in such a short space of time!

[bandonbanshee.livejournal.com]

Oh wow - that sounds... fun. :s ;)

Still, I am looking forward to it, language barrier aside!